José Antonio Hermida Ramos: The Tireless One

Now almost 35 years old, the likeable Spaniard is far from being an old hand. For years he has been among the world's top 10, he has already taken part in the Olympics four times, and he is still far from thinking about quitting.

by Rolf Fleckenstein

Some people who are getting on in years in top-class sport when they pass 30 give serious thought to retirement and a life after sport. For José, that doesn't seem to be an issue at all. Before the last Olympic Games, he was asked whether he would end his career after London. In response, he said that he did not plan to stop after London, but would rather try to take part in the next Olympic Games in Brazil. That would be his fifth Olympics and he is confident of that.

Mountain bike: love at first sight
José grew up in Puigcerda, a town of around 7,000 inhabitants in the Catalan Pyrenees, a stone's throw from the French border, where he still lives today with his wife and two children. The bike was not his first choice, rather as a boy he had devoted himself to skateboarding, on which he and his buddies spent every free minute. He didn't discover the sport until its boom years in the early '90s, when he saw a friend with a bike he'd never seen before, equipped with fat tires that allowed him to explore everything. With his skateboard, that wasn't possible. His home was the mountains, the snow, and few asphalt roads on which to skate. The bike gave him the freedom to move anywhere. When he. ...(the whole article with personal profile can be found in Sportguide Bike - issue 03/2013)

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